India's `Untouchable' Christians Push for Protection

September 16, 2008

Author: Vishal Arora

Source: The Charlotte Observer

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/175/story/196942.html

Franklin Caesar Thomas was one of India's millions of unlucky souls, born into a Dalit, or outcast, family that is the lowest of the low in this nation's rigid caste system.

His parents converted from Hinduism to Christianity, hoping for an escape. They sacrificed and saved to send their son to college for separate degrees in mechanical engineering and law.

Still, he was a Dalit, an “untouchable.” He was thrown out of a restaurant in his home town of Thirukattupalli, in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, for daring to sit near upper-caste Hindus.

“A grocer assaulted me for touching his hand as I gave him money for my purchase,” recalled Thomas, 45, a lump rising in his throat. “I told him I was an educated man, but he still thought I had made him `unclean.“'

A constitutional change passed more than a half-century ago was meant to provide some protection from discrimination for Hindu Dalits. But it doesn't cover those who, like Thomas, are converts to Christianity or Islam.

Known as the Presidential Order of 1950, the constitutional clause assumes that non-Hindu religions do not have a caste hierarchy, and therefore do not need protection. However, the order was amended in 1956 to include Sikh Dalits, and in 1990 to cover Buddhist Dalits — neither of which has a caste hierarchy.

Thomas is now a co-petitioner in an ongoing case before the Supreme Court of India that challenges protections for “Scheduled Castes” that guarantee welfare benefits and 15 percent of government jobs and seats in educational institutions. Seats in parliament and state assemblies are also reserved for the “Scheduled Castes” in proportion to their population.